


when I think about you / my whole world falls through

by sigmalibrae



Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator - All Media Types, Terminator: Dark Fate
Genre: And a hell of a lot of posturing, Angst, Banter, Consensual Sex, Dirty Talk, F/F, Fingerfucking, Fix-It of Sorts, I don't know that I could write these two without that, Movie: Terminator: Dark Fate, Multiple Orgasms, Mutually annoyed stress fucking, Not Canon Compliant, POV Sarah, Porn With Plot, Wall Sex, and references to Grace/Dani because I can't NOT acknowledge that they're totally a thing, and whatever Grace and Sarah have going on is something else entirely, fast and loose with canon, part two electric boogaloo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:35:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21829831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sigmalibrae/pseuds/sigmalibrae
Summary: There’s a gust of wind that kicks up dust on the sides of the road and whips through Grace’s hair. She scans around, as if air could contain a threat, and in doing so notices Sarah’s observation. Eyes bluer than the sky that’s open all around them. Frozen thunderstorm. Sarah gets a prickle down her spine.Neither moves.They’re waiting, Sarah knows, to find out who’ll be the first to blink.
Relationships: Sarah Connor/Grace
Comments: 12
Kudos: 44





	when I think about you / my whole world falls through

_Guns and ammunition  
Make bullets out of you  
You speak dynamic fiction  
And I see right through that too_

\--

Sarah rotates her shoulder, still smarting at the joint where Grace pinned her earlier in the day. A lightning-quick disarm. Crackle of pain all through her, still twinging in her spine when she moves too quickly. The inexorable pressure she’d felt in her wrist, on her back; a heavy body, stronger than she’d expected, and she’d been immobilized against the cool wall of the motel room. 

In the back of the truck they’re riding in, Grace holds Dani’s head in her lap. Sarah can see the tilt of Grace’s face, how she looks down; angle says it all. It’s like she’s searching for something, trying to map or memorize. Sarah can see her in the rear-view, letting her in on a narrow slice of what’s going on. 

There’s a gust of wind that kicks up dust on the sides of the road and whips through Grace’s hair. She scans around, as if air could contain a threat, and in doing so notices Sarah’s observation. Eyes bluer than the sky that’s open all around them. Frozen thunderstorm. Sarah gets a prickle down her spine.

Neither moves.

They’re waiting, Sarah knows, to find out who’ll be the first to blink.

\--

Someone she’s underestimated gets the drop on her, and it’s the first real surprise she’s had in at least a year. Sarah thinks back to the moment when she could have noticed how strange this woman was. Clutching a piece of steel rebar as effortlessly as she would a baseball bat – the Terminator had been _right_ there, so it was easy to discount them at first as random bystanders, unlucky in the cross-fire. Except for the detail of the metal in her hands. Their positioning wasn’t exactly a giveaway, in her estimation, which is why she’d intended to come back to them later. But the brazen theft of Sarah’s car – now, that was a piss-off. More worthy of note. All her _good_ shit was still packed in the back trunk, after all.

Things kept getting more and more interesting from there. Grace, sweaty, staggering when she found them in front of the Pharmacy – painfully easy to track them. Still trying to shield Dani even when her eyes were rolling back into her skull. There are stories of mothers who lift a car off their child in a crisis, their nervous systems overriding the limits of their bodies. Sure, they might tear a ligament or rip apart their own muscles, might push the cardiovascular system too far and pay for it later. But it’s strange, what love and desperation can fuel. Whatever was done to Grace – enhanced, she’d said – lets her brush off what would kill anyone else ten times over.

Grace obeys Dani without question. Reigns in that almost limitless power at a word. For all her intensity, there’s a level of control and competence that Sarah would admire, if it was something she could trust. She was going to try to take Sarah out, if Sarah’d made an untoward move. Could’ve. Except Dani vouched for her, wanted to hear what she had to say.

Sarah rolls her shoulder again, slower this time.

\--

Grace looks away.

\--

It’s not a victory, though – the reason for the cyborg’s shift in attention makes itself known, when Dani tilts into view, rising up like a marionette. Grace tracks her all the while, Sarah notices, eyes only for the smaller woman. They exchange quiet words. Grace shrugs.

There’s no way to know what’s said. Grace is careful not to move her lips. Maybe she’s picked up on the fact that Sarah can read them, sort of; the purr of the engine through the main cab is too loud to catch anything regardless. Beside her, the driver sweats. He’s taken Sarah in a couple of times, now, noting the vest, the white of her skin, how she has a duffle slung next to her in the seat that he’s not dared asked any questions about. If she was a kinder woman, she’d tell him this isn’t what he thinks, she’s not what he suspects… Instead, she lets him wonder where her eyes are. Must be difficult to tell, with the aviators. 

Not for Grace.

She’s tucking some hair behind Dani’s ear and Sarah catches the way her hand lingers, hovering, not quite touching the skin there but not drawing away, either. Dani shakes her head, looking so tired Sarah almost feels it in _her_ bones, and dips back out of view. Likely trying to figure out where they were.

_Why do you care so much about her?_

What must it be like, opening your eyes to a disorienting landscape around you? Sarah’s desensitized to that kind of thing happening, by now, and can’t recall how it’d been during those nightmare days back in the 80’s. Even the memory of having lived through it is dull. As though it happened to someone else.

 _Because I_ was _her._

Grace meets her gaze one more time, almost flinches, and looks back out over the horizon with her jaw set. A tick at the corner of her mouth. Heartrending loyalty etched there – she’s acting too familiar, not to know Dani personally.

So that’s the difference.

\--

They’re together more out of interest convergence, Sarah thinks. Tells herself that, while scrubbing the sun-sweat and desert dirt out of her skin in the shower. They’ve said what’s needed saying to Dani’s uncle and Dani is helping him get ready for their long trip north on the train, tonight or the next. Maybe she’s processing grief with him, or opening up to it slowly through the numb terror she’s gotta be feeling. He’s her family too – might be all that’s left of it. They’ll be gathering supplies. In the meantime Sarah’s got the run of the house, and she needed a goddamn shower.

The door latch clicks.

“You couldn’t have waited?” Sarah says, without turning around.

Grace closes the door, leans against it when she’s done. 

“Just thought we should sort some things out between us.”

“Is this because I’m unarmed, then? Supposedly vulnerable?”

Just the sound of the water for a second. Grace snorts. “For all I know.”

“Smart not to be so sure.”

“Yes, _sir_ ,” Grace retorts, and Sarah half turns her head at the tone to peer through the steam surrounding her. The cyborg has her arms folded, fingers dug into the flesh of her own biceps so hard Sarah can see the indents. Her scar tissue is livid, shows up pale; the scrapes along her forearms hinting at the metal underneath, some kind of mesh, and Sarah can’t shake the feeling that this reads Machine. But she’s been watching Grace. Machines don’t have a capacity for the emotions she’s been displaying. No hearts to break.

“What is this?” Sarah asks. The shower dial squeaks, shrills under her hand – the water hisses to a stop, starts to gurgle down the drain. She doesn’t break, pushes open the half-door that separates her from the rest of the tiled room and steps out. They’re playing with fire and both know it. “You’re saying you want to sort shit out? So _sort_ it. You’ve got a job to do. You can’t afford divided attention.”

Moving closer, she watches Grace tense. Water runs rivulets down from her hair, tickles over her collarbones and lower. How long has it been since someone’s looked at her like this?

Grace swallows.

“Why are you helping us?”

“I don’t make a habit of repeating myself.” Prickling gooseflesh is rising on Sarah’s arms and her jaw wants to clench, but she steadies herself before she can shiver and continues forward. “You know why.”

“I want to hear you say it.”

Sarah shrugs, reaching just past Grace’s body for a towel on the counter. “For John, then.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Oh, you don’t? That’s too damn bad.” She starts to dry herself off, watching Grace’s expression all the while for any tells. Soft texture around her back, scrubbing down the arms, reaching between her legs for an instant. Sees the flicker of Grace’s eyes down and back as she does so. That’s interesting.

“You told me you were her, once. What did you mean?”

“What a shocker, you actually listened.”

“I’m just trying to understand–”

“There’s nothing more _to_ understand,” Sarah finally snaps. Whatever Grace is angling for, she’s not in a mood to give out. There’s no point wicking off her legs anymore, not if she wants to make a point, so she just tosses the towel down to the ground and scrapes it behind her with a foot across the slippery tile. Grace towers above her, but Sarah gets even more into her space.

“I go on. That’s enough. You know my motivations – they don’t run deeper. No hidden depths to plumb. My home country has me designated insane, an anti-technology terrorist, a vigilante who kills what looks like people so thoroughly there never _are_ remains. You show up. There are Terminators. Someone else who might go through the same shit I did. The only reason I’m still travelling with you is because that motherfucker is tracking her, which means I have a job to do. Plus, you’ve got some coordinates tattooed on your body that’ll lead me to whoever keeps _fucking_ with me.”

Grace is trying to remain impassive, Sarah can tell, but unfolds her arms and flexes her fingers at her side. Once, twice. She’s angled in as though Sarah’s a magnet, likely doesn’t even realize that’s the case. “What’ll you do when you get there?”

“Improvise. It’s what I’m good at.”

That’s enough for now, but when Sarah starts to turn away, Grace speaks up again with a note of desperation in her voice.

“Listen… if something happens, between here and then, will you promise me something? Look after her.”

Irritation. Like a flint-spark.

“Don’t insult me. As if you couldn’t tell that was the plan already.”

“I need to hear you–”

“Fine, fine!” Sarah flings her hands up. “Christ, try repressing a little bit more of your oh-so-earnest desire to die for this woman, would you? I get it, she’s all that matters, but you’re not leaving any mystery to outside observers. Not hard to figure out why _you’re_ doing this; anyone with half a brain cell could see that you love her. You’re single-minded with it.”

Grace doesn’t say anything. It’s like there’s a lag – once again, Sarah thinks of Machines. Beat, beat. She’s given Grace plenty of input. Time to see what she does with it.

\--

“Not _exactly_ single-minded,” Grace says, voice almost breaking with it, hoarse.

\--

As Grace leans in, Sarah sidesteps. Twists Grace’s arm up behind her back, uses the momentary skid of a foot against water left on the floor to throw her off-balance. Momentum, a pivot; Grace winds up knocked into the counter, bent double at the waist, face next to the sink.

\--

Sarah breathes hard, keeps applying pressure. If circumstances were different she would have let something happen. Seen where this was going to go. She exults in knowing she read Grace correctly; smoulders because she’s _angry_. This is payback. A message. Grace doesn’t move, even though Sarah knows that’s a choice – which means this is her, ceding ground.

\--

Sarah leans in, a fraction harder.

“This world hurts enough as it is,” she says from between clenched teeth, heart pounding hard enough she feels it in her temple. “Don’t you _dare_ use me for self-punishment. And if I’m reading that aspect of this wrong, then for fuck’s sake, respect my goddamn privacy or give me the courtesy of a little warning next time.”

Releasing her grip, she steps back. Picks up her towel where she dropped it, wraps it around herself, and leaves, hoping she’s not shaky as she goes. In her peripheral vision she watches Grace straighten up behind her. The look on her face is unreadable.

\--

There are two moments in the next twenty-four hours that stand out to Sarah:

One, in the pen, where Sarah is reminded of all the reasons she sometimes wishes the world _would_ burn – humans putting each other in cages, separated families, and the despairing look in Dani’s eyes as Sarah’s led away by the smug prick who thinks he’s got it coming to her. Grace is nowhere in sight, and that’s a small mercy – at least she won’t be able to hold Sarah accountable for failing here too.

Two, as she sprints across the rooftop for the helicopter: Grace, hands on the controls, ready to escape, snarling her horror and objections; and Dani dropping a few feet to the rooftop, gun held out in front of her with the stance all wrong and her arms too straight and fear rabbit-bright in her eyes, firing on the Terminator leaping behind Sarah. She snatches the gun away from Dani, barreling them both into the cockpit as Grace dips low enough to catch them and yanks them into the sky, fires: one-two-three-four, each one striking the _Thing_ behind them with just enough force to knock it away.

For those fragmentary moments she sees in Dani a shadow of her younger self, the one who existed before Sarah had to scorch all remnants of that woman out of herself forever. At first it was for the sake of bravery, and later, necessity; and when she sees Grace, with tears raised in her eyes and sweat beading on her brow, heaving with panic and adrenaline, she knows that Grace is thinking forward. Someone who saved her on the mind. Grace seeing a different kind of shade, someone she’ll never get home to unless they get a chance at this in another life.

They lock gazes and Sarah elbows into the passenger seat after making sure Dani is okay, giving her a shot of whiskey from her hip-flask. Puts on a headset and starts to navigate them through the night sky. Easier getting where they need to go when there’s a little teamwork involved.

\--

They land in early dawn. It’s a short hike to the location at the coordinates, and through the blinding, pulsating _hate_ that Sarah feels as the world slows around her and a cabin door opens on the thing that _killed her son and did this to her,_ Grace jerks the shotgun up and away. Can’t stop her from firing a handgun into its chest a split second later, but Sarah remembers that later – that Grace saw what she was about to do, and tried to stop it. It’s been a long time since anyone’s succeeded at stopping her from doing anything.

She tolerates as much of the conversation that comes next as she can stomach before she has to leave. Grace watches her go; Dani follows.

The more that Dani talks with her, the more she listens to Sarah fall apart, the more that Sarah understands why Grace got it bad for her. Fierce hope, in this one, something that won’t die unless lye is poured on it. Maybe even _if_ that happens. Capable of leading. Able to take direction, too, as Sarah steps in to whisper against Dani’s ear the words that get her to straighten, shoot true with deadly accuracy. Dangerous, that – Sarah realizes that she could mould Dani into a version of herself if she’s not careful, if they get through this okay.

\--

They sleep there, for a brief few hours before dark – the Terminator's home the safest place they could take respite before they have to drive like the world’s ending all over again. Nothing has found it out here thus far, which means it’s careful and probably shielded somehow – capable of avoiding detection, at least for a little while. It gives them all a chance to avoid exhaustion. In the cabin is a spare bedroom, one that goes to Dani and Grace without hesitation or question.

Sarah spends her time outside, in a shed that smells like peat and cut-cedar and metal shavings. It has an old cot stored there, tucked up against the wall beside a clean workbench and a set of yard tools. She sets up alone.

\--

Twilight is just starting to spread through the sky when Sarah wakes to a quiet rapping at the door.

\--

It opens on Grace, hand still lifted. In this light Sarah can only just barely make out her eyes.

“I… I can’t,” she whispers. “Dani’s still asleep. I need to… can I come in?”

\--

Sarah yanks her in by the front of her shirt and instantly, Grace is all over her. Hands scrape through her hair, hold her face immobile – it’s less a kiss than a collision. The shed door closes of its own accord and Sarah lifts a forearm to Grace’s chest, pushes _back_ until they with a _bang_ against the wood. She’s scraping teeth none too kindly over the skin at Grace’s collarbones. Wants to devour. Wants Grace to look at her like that again. She feels the sting as Grace’s hands tug, threaded through her hair before they’re roaming, hard down the sides of her neck and onto her shoulders.

“Please-”

Sarah feels hands tugging at her shirt.

“Not yet,” she mutters.

A noise of frustration from back in Grace’s throat before she’s being drawn in even closer, unable to back away – the cyborg’s fingers caught in her waistband, thumbs in belt-loops, _hold still come here_. Sarah presses the heels of her hands in at the tender part of Grace’s shoulder joints. Tension, pressure, the wall as an equalizer – Grace’s back to it. Sarah’s got her hips squared, flat to Grace’s, angling a thigh in between her legs. Every inch of her body leveraged to keep Grace where she _is_. It’s not enough. Farcical and they know it. Grace is letting her do this. The hint of fight just to test whether Sarah’s going to yield or let her get away with it. So instead, she brackets in tighter, skims her hands down Grace’s arms until she can feel a pulse in the wrists beneath her thumbs.

Some kind of good contact must be happening because Grace leans her head back, mouth parted as Sarah grinds up into her.

“What exactly did you expect from this?” Sarah asks, because that’s important, as far as guidelines go.

“I don’t know,” Grace gasps.

“Not good enough.”

It’s harder to keep the want an abstract thing, now that Grace is a tactile reality beneath her hands – hunger like a wind inside her, rattling the framework. Sarah reaches up to tug Grace’s head to one side, by a handful of hair, mouths against the neck again slower but eases off the pressure with her leg. C’mon. Give her something to work with.

“Just get this out of my system,” the response comes at last. “I need her but she doesn’t know _how_.”

“Be more _specific_.” 

“For _fuck's sake,_ fuck me!” Grace erupts. “Get me off! Take me out of my head!”

“That’s more like it,” Sarah replies, low and satisfied, as though she didn’t feel a crackle through her spine at the words. “Gonna need you to stay focused for me.”

Grace helps her out with the buckle and zipper situation; Sarah doesn’t wait for Grace to finish kicking off the second leg of her jeans before she places her forearm back against Grace’s collarbones and slips the other hand between her legs. Under her fingers Grace is hot velvet, wet and easy to angle up against and into, exploratory for the time being just to see what works. Grace wraps her arms around Sarah’s shoulders and holds tight, careful, so careful.

“God, a little higher,” she urges, and Sarah gladly listens, angling her hip back into place against Grace’s for leverage and stability. A twitch through Grace’s entire body when Sarah finds her clit; a swear muffled against her shoulder as Grace moans, open-mouthed.

“Easy,” Sarah chides, but she’s a gasoline fire. Every sound from Grace is pretty thorough encouragement. Welcome distraction for both of them. She slides easily, direct, and she’s fucking impressed at Grace – holding herself up, legs shaking slightly but solidly planted, and as Sarah leans in Grace’s hips start rocking up into the touch. “Yeah, like that–”

Once there’s a rhythm, once she’s sure Grace isn’t going anywhere, Sarah lifts her free arm away from Grace’s front, smears her fingers over Grace’s lips – can’t hold back a noise, low back in her throat, as Grace opens her eyes and takes Sarah’s fingers into her mouth. Tongue flat against the pads of them. Sucking on them. She tilts her head back so Sarah knows when to withdraw, head reeling a little, and Grace gasps.

Her fingers are digging so hard into Sarah’s back she’ll be shocked if there aren’t bruises or scrapes, one or the other. Her skin smarts as Grace releases her grip abruptly, uses both hands to cover her own mouth, holds very still as Sarah works against her. Like she wants the noises she’s making to stay held in, and when she comes it’s with a bitten-off scream into her own palms, nearly buckling as she tries to hold herself up. She’d be doubled forward if Sarah wasn’t there to lean against.

“C’mon, are you done already?” Sarah challenges, and Grace shakes her head. Breath is a rattle.

From between Grace’s fingers Sarah hears, “should I expect _more_? Or is that all you’ve–!”

She’s cut off with a muffled scream as Sarah pushes inside for a moment before withdrawing. “Not even _close_ ,” Sarah bares her teeth, “though it feels like you are again, aren’t you?”

“Fuck–!”

Grace comes again, so fast Sarah’s pretty sure it counts as a continuation of the first, and when Sarah checks once more with her hand there’s even more wet, more warmth between Grace’s trembling legs. “Oh _really_? Needed this bad, didn’t you? Is this how she got you off, when you’re from? Did she fuck you up against the wall until you couldn’t stand? Go on her knees in front of you until you came against her mouth?”

Grace _moans,_ bites against the heel of her own hand again and glares at Sarah.

“Is that what you’re thinking about while I do this?” Sarah continues. “I intend to give your Dani a run for her money. Did you ever come with her inside you?”

A hand digs in at Sarah’s shoulder, makes her hiss with the suddenness of it. “If you don’t… you’d better…”

“Sounds good?”

“ _Yes_.”

“You’d better tell me when, then. I’m not going anywhere. Could do this for hours.”

That’s a lie, but it gets Grace rocking against her all over again, like it was a dare; something impatient in her movements, as if urging herself towards another one and not even bothering to stay quiet anymore. Grace’s teeth are clenched and she stares into Sarah’s eyes, grinds against her fingers.

“You’re practically doing all the work, here,” Sarah mutters, and just like that Grace is coming apart for her. Sarah slips lower and in, relishes the cry Grace lets out, feels her heartbeat around her fingers. A mantra, _alive alive alive_ despite all the shit they’ve been through these last couple of days. From the way she’s clinging on, breath hot where her mouth is open and panting against Sarah’s shoulder, seems like this is exactly what Grace was after. Well, good for her.

Once the obvious aftershocks are through, Sarah withdraws; pats Grace once or twice on the shoulder and then wonders if that was too much. Stepping back it’s easy to tell this whole thing had some effect on her. She’ll deal with that later, quickly, if there’s a chance. Without Sarah there, Grace slumps against the wall. Her chest rises and falls quickly. Her hair falls in front of her face, and she brushes it to one side. Looks up at Sarah. A jolt goes all through her when she sees the intent in Grace’s eyes.

“Your turn,” she breathes, and within two strides she’s on top of Sarah, grabbing her up to kiss hard against Sarah’s mouth, seizing the front of her shirt to draw her in in an echo of how this all started and at the same time forcing her to stumble back. When they hit the edge of the cot the metal frame scrapes away with the force of them, long edge of it landing pushed up to the wall. At that point Grace simply… lets go, and without the momentum Sarah topples backwards, caught once again off guard and half-lying, half-sitting against it.

No time to settle on the blankets before Grace is already bent over her, one knee on the cot and the other leg braced against the floor. She handles the closures of Sarah’s pants deftly enough and tugs them down, softens her touch to skim a hand up Sarah’s navel. Lands with a palm against her sternum. _Thud-thud-thud_ of her heartbeat where Grace’s too-warm skin meets her own.

“Well?” Grace probes.

“Do it if you’re going to,” which is as close as Sarah can let herself get to asking for it.

Grace applies a bit more pressure to her chest, almost to the point where Sarah can feel the impact it has on her ability to draw a full breath. “A lot, or..?”

“Depends.”

“Inside, out, or both?”

“Both suits me fine,” Sarah replies, edgily – but her heart is still going and she’s _irritated_. Hurry up and… but Grace trails a single fingertip, lazy in a line down Sarah’s front, and she loses the train of thought. It’s ticklish. It’s pointed. Grace gets into position and then makes Sarah wait for it, until she’s regained enough presence of mind to think about snapping in frustration. But then she’s sliding three fingers into her up to the last joint in one go.

“ _Oh_ , fucking _Jesus_ –!” Except a second hand follows, almost too warm with the palm and fingers against Sarah’s low belly and Grace’s thumb able to press and _rub_ somewhere that Sarah feels as instant and bright as a road-flare in the dark. Grace is full up into her, overwhelming and controlled, calculated in how much she’s giving; it’s enough that Sarah doesn’t realize she’s closed her eyes, or that her mouth has dropped open until she needs to swallow.

When she’s opened her eyes Grace is utterly concentrated, zeroed in on her, and Sarah sees a smirk playing around the corner of her mouth as she sees that Sarah’s attention is back. “What? Thought that this was only going to go one way?”

“I…” Sarah struggles to string enough words together; there’s heat, a pleasurable ache, almost too much because it’s not something she’s giving to herself for once, and it’s building low and heavy. “Well, I’d be disappointed if you—”

“Trying to play it off like you expected this?” Grace says, lazily, and Sarah bites off a swear as something Grace touches inside her tightens everything for an instant. “You recovered quickly, I’ll give you that, but come on.”

The blankets are bunching in her fists as Sarah tries to tilt her hips up. “Fuck off.”

“Mm, a little lower then?” Grace adjusts where her thumb is pressing, responding to how Sarah’s angling up towards her. Hums low as Sarah has to bite off a swear again, a low looping flare singing through her. “That’s it, isn’t it? You don’t seem the type to want something light. Be interesting to see if that was the case, but this is more what you’re after. Direct. No nonsense.”

“Lucky guess,” Sarah manages, but her concentration is shot, there’s just Grace moving inside without ever fully withdrawing and rubbing firm and insistent against her.

“Quick study,” Grace says smugly, and laughs as Sarah tightens around her again, this is so much, this woman is going to make her come–

And then oh, oh, like the wind from an explosive going off, it’s all through her, it’s burning her out fast and high like a match striking, and Grace is leaning into her, pressing up and in and holding her down until Sarah can’t think anymore and doesn’t notice the absence left when Grace pulls away.

\--

“Was it like this for you?”

“With Kyle?” Sarah taps out the ash of the cigarette they’re sharing. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about that. What happened with him and I, that wasn’t love.”

“Your son?”

“Didn’t do anything wrong. Kyle probably thought it was love but he didn’t _know_ me. He showed up with a picture of me in his pocket and a legend in his mind, and that’s what he operated on. Maybe the whole time some part of him was getting off on the idea of fathering the savior of humanity.”

Grace holds out her hand without a word and Sarah finishes her next drag, passes the cigarette over. They’d found some clean shop rags bundled in a tall cabinet and some bottles of purified water to clean up with, a little, but this was necessary to diffuse any awkwardness that might exist, not that there would be any. You shoot the shit. Have a smoke. Move on. Sarah blows a long fountain of smoke into the air before finishing her thought.

“He got to die a hero, and leave me with the disaster of everything that followed. The fucker.”

“You didn’t deserve that either. With Dani and me… it’s not like that. I promise you. It wasn’t.”

“I wouldn’t have let this happen if I thought it was. You don’t have to convince me.” Sarah gestures around the room, accepting the smoke back. “I get all of this. I do. We understand each other but you’re not dying for _me_.”

“Stop that.”

“Hm?”

“I didn’t want to sleep with you as some kind of _surrogate_. That’s not what this is.” Grace grabs the side of Sarah’s face, forces her to look over. “Fine. I love Dani. And we can both admit what this is but… all I’ve seen from you is strength, and power, and… you _survived_. You’re a reminder to me that’s possible, after everything.” 

“Don’t go making some kind of role model of me. I’m the wrong person for this kind of pep talk.”

“Well, now you’ve heard it.” Grace releases, and it tingles where her fingers were. 

The glowing ember is getting too close to her fingertips. Sarah stubs out the butt.

\--

“That’s our problem, isn’t it? Both a little too willing to disappear.”

\--

The Machine interrupts them talking any further by knocking on the door.

“We need to move,” it’s saying. “Or we will not arrive with adequate time to meet your contact.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Sarah snaps.

She meets Grace’s eyes.

“Not a word,” she begins, but Grace silences her with a shake of her head.

“Wasn’t thinking of it.” 

\--

It’s all fucked some hours later – they open the briefcase on the plane to see one smoking, damaged EMP and an empty foam-lined socket where the other should be. Grace’s face plummets and then sets. Sarah’s seen that face before, on herself too many times in the mirror. Something colder than resignation.

Dani is desperate, agonized, but Sarah hardens herself against the pain of the smaller woman. Already thinking ahead to what she’s going to have to do – the truths she’s going to have to sear into Dani’s mind to get her through the next several years of her life once Grace is gone.

When she catches Grace’s eye, Grace just nods grimly.

They’ve got an understanding, after all.

\--

She’d think she’d get used to this, after a while.

But she never does.

\--

In the kill box, the hydroelectric dam, with fires all around them and a high whine in her ears – if she’s damaged her hearing even worse, she’s gonna be pissed.

What she hadn’t expected: the Terminator, flinging itself in front of Grace before the explosion, taking the brunt of the impact. Grace nearly took a shard of metal to her jugular; Sarah saw the reflection of it in her widened eyes as it screamed past. The Machine wasn’t so lucky; but then, she’s not as concerned about the blood on its throat.

Except, she tried something stupid, and now there’s agonizing bright pain through all of her nerves, and it intensifies with every movement. The liquid metal might be gone, but its endoskeleton still stalks around the room, and there’s nothing she can do except put herself in its way. So she does.

See, this time her shoulder is dislocated, and the associated arm dangles uselessly at her side. She feels wind rushing around her, and closes her eyes – it has to be the Rev-9, and she hears Grace’s yell, Dani’s shriek, and waits for it to end.

\--

“Sarah _, move!”_

\--

Not the voice she was expecting to hear. 

\--

She opens her eyes a sliver as she hurls herself left and back, responding to what the Terminator demanded of her, colliding against someone – Grace, it’s Grace holding her up even as her other arm compresses the massive wound in her side. Almost can't register what she's seeing: 

Carl, exploding past her, with an undamaged EMP in his hand, shoving it into the Rev-9’s mouth, breaking its jaw with the bulk of it. They careen out of Sarah’s view, beyond the flaming remains of the generator and into one of the pits.

\--

Arcs of energy bright enough that Grace’s eyes almost seem to glow silver from them, as the three of them limp over to the pit. They watch the death throes, see the red fail in the Terminator’s eyes and then fade from Carl’s.

“For John,” he whispers before he goes. “And my final apology to you.”

\--

Sarah howls as she snaps her limb back into its socket, with Grace’s help. Dani doesn’t turn away at the sight, to her credit, even though she looks dazed and has blood matted into her hair. Despite the fact that Sarah knows she’ll regret it later, she rotates her shoulder once; twice. That'll need medical attention, but lucky for them... they're going to need to steal some more meds, so. Two birds with one stone. Steadies herself against Grace’s forearm. Listens to the fire crackling around them, the steady blaring of the alarm finally sinking into her consciousness. They’re going to have to raze this to the ground. They’re going to have to plan their next move. Sarah wasn’t expecting there to _be_ a next move, and from the way Grace is leaning into her, it doesn’t seem like she did either. There's a huge, shuddering relief building, rolling through her body - Sarah feels it locking up her throat, smells it like petrichor.

It's nice to be _wrong_. 

She sees Grace in her peripherals, trying to catch her attention.

Looks over.

Sarah blinks, because, well, she can’t quite believe it.

And then she smiles, even though she hurts.

**Author's Note:**

> (July Talk encompasses ~the dynamic~ here as far as I'm concerned).  
> Lord help me I'm still on my bullshit as far as these two go, but hey - I'm having fun here, even if everything about Sarah Connor makes me want to cry sometimes. 
> 
> For anyone who may be wondering: the DVD will be released in North America on January 28, 2020, and I don't know about ya'll but I've reserved my copy. 
> 
> Cheers. Thanks as always for reading.


End file.
